Gary Farrelly: Terminal Compositions (DALLAS)

Ro2 Art is excited to welcome the return of Irish artist Gary Farrelly, for Terminal Compositions, his third artistic venture in Dallas. The opening reception will take place Friday, November 9 from 7 to 10pm, with the show running through December 9, 2012. Terminal Compositions will be on exhibition at Ro2 Art's DOWNTOWN PROJECTS space, located at 110 N. Akard Street, in the historic Kirby Building of Downtown Dallas.

For the exhibition, the artist creates a world where beauty is found in airport terminals, road maps, skyscrapers, statistics, cryptography and rubber stamped bureaucracy. Amongst the work in Dallas is a series of bird’s eye views of airport terminals. The physical production of the work is characterized by obsessive mark making, redaction and repetitive reworking in collage, water colour and pen. The artist describes the colours and overall atmosphere of the show as “simultaneously jaded and jubilant.”

About Gary Farrelly

Gary Farrelly graduated from Ireland's National College of Art and Design in 2006. During his time at NCAD, he was a founding member of the Dublin-based art movement Defastenism. Since graduation, he has dedicated himself to his art practice both at home and abroad. He spent 2006 through 2009 in Paris where his studio was at Espace W, and he was represented by Galerie W. In 2010, the artist embarked on several projects in Dallas, where he was a resident at CentralTrak, The University of Texas Artist Residency and had a solo exhibition at Guerrilla Arts.

The artist is currently in residence at Pickering Forest in Ireland. Farrelly has had six solo exhibitions in Dublin, Paris and Dallas and has shown in dozens of group shows in cities including Tehran, New York, Belgrade, Istanbul and Berlin.

Artist Statement

This exhibition is comprised of new works produced while I was artist in residence at the profoundly rural and isolated Pickering Forest in The Republic of Ireland. I produced a body of work as a reaction to the relentless natural phenomena that would encroach upon my working environment there. At Pickering, I would commute on foot to my studio through dense, dank forest punished by the unpredictable and ever-changing weather systems (all of them damp and cold). I have come to see nature as a force against which I contextualize both myself and my work.

The door to my studio became a portal that transported me to the world as I imagine and idealize it – a world where beauty is found in airport terminals, road maps, skyscrapers, statistics, cryptography and rubber stamped bureaucracy.

Amongst the work in Dallas is a series of bird’s eye views of airport terminals. There are airports already in the world that take the names of President Kennedy, General De Gaulle and The Ayatollah Khomeini. I propose airports named after John Waters, David Lynch and Diane Arbus. The physical production of the work is characterized by obsessive mark making, redaction and repetitive reworking in collage, water colour and pen. I describe the colours and overall atmosphere of the show as simultaneously jaded and jubilant.

- Gary Farrelly, 2012

More info: http://www.ro2art.com/terminal-compositions---presspage.html